ROGER MONROE

At-large City Councilman Zach Oyler’s action at a recent council meeting raised eyebrows. Oyler made a motion to reconsider the council’s unanimous decision to impose a 1% grocery tax, effective Jan. 1, 2026. Members felt imposition of the tax was necessary because Governor JB Pritzker eliminated the state’s 1% grocery tax as of the same date. Pritzker’s decision would cost Peoria $5 million in revenue without the local tax. Multiple municipalities like East Peoria and Pekin also voted to approve a grocery tax.

Oyler initially voted for the tax, he said, because a motion for reconsideration can only come from a member in favor of the original motion. So what was his beef? He said two members, Dennis Cyr and John Kelly, missed the meeting when the tax was passed. He wanted them to have a chance to vote along with new member Alex Carmona. As far as I know, they were not unhappy, but did not express support for Oyler’s motion. Neither did anyone else. Oyler’s motion died for a lack of a second.

Just about everyone knows, unless a politician is seeking publicity, you don’t go into a meeting and make a motion when you don’t have the votes to be successful. It’s like spitting in the wind. But … That’s what Oyler did. In the process he wasted the council’s time. I reached out to Oyler for an explanation, but got no response.

A RECORD OF COMMUNITY SERVICE: Chuck Grayeb is no longer on the City Council. The former Second District representative opted to run for mayor rather than seek re-election. While he lost the race for City Hall, we hope he sticks around and even considers running for an at-large seat in two years.

That’s what Chuck did from 1995 to 2007. He ran for City Council and was elected from the Second District in 2013 and re-elected in 2017 and 2021. What’s next for Chuck Grayeb? “I’m not going to retire,” he told us. “Everything is on the table.”

The native Peorian is a graduate of Bradley University with B.A. and M.A. Degrees in Education. He taught for nine years at Peoria High School and was Dean of Students at Manual High School from 1980 to 1985 and then served for the next 20 years as Administrator of Adult Education for School District 150. Quite a record of public service.

WHAT IS HAPPENING TO LOCAL NEWS? I remember the days when local radio stations competed to be the first in reporting a fire, an auto crash, a shooting. WIRL was considered the best with “Big Red” and “Little Red,” and had the likes of news reporters like Ira Bittner. WMBD had Phil Gibson and Joe Rex and WXCL had their staff of news people. Today, WIRL has no local news. Period. WMBD is down to two or three news stories, sometimes maybe four, and six commercials before and another five to six after news. No news at all on WOAM-1350, formerly WXCL. WPEO and the Pekin station, once known as WSIV, are both religious and have no interest in local news. And forget the newspaper. If it has any local news, the stories are two days old when it arrives in the mailbox.

TV news is much the same. Stations change reporters more often than the homeless change underwear and most are so young they can’t buy alcohol unless it;s on Farmington Road with the other college kids. Anchors mispronounce streets and towns like San Jose and the news crawl frequently misspells words.

Selection of lead stories are questionable in news value. A good example is the WEEK top story the second week of May was about a naked man pooping on Court Street in Pekin. I was surprised the news anchor didn’t say, “More to come.”

And no one questioned the politics of local new stations in the day of Tom Connor, Bob Arthur, or Bob Larson. Today, the political slant is so obvious and bigoted many have stopped watching broadcast news, switching to cable. TV crews will show up to cover six to nine people in front of a political office, but ignore missing money at a pubic TV station or a local charitable agency. A 64-year-old man from Edelstein, co-owner of a Peoria business, is murdered in Costa Rica, but no one in local newsrooms knows about it because they’re busy covering a garage fire in an alley on Howett Street.

MR. PRESIDENT: Our thanks to new Bradley University president Jim Shadid for the in-depth interview he provided on “Breakfast with Roger and Friends.” Shadid talked about his first few weeks on the job and said the future is bright for one of America’s great universities.

SALUTING AMERICAN LEGION POST #2: Every Memorial Day weekend the men and women of Peoria’s American Legion Post #2 participate in the many ceremonies honoring and remembering those service members who lost their lives.

They provide Honor and Color Guards throughout the Peoria area. It’s an exhausting schedule. It’s disappointing that some of the ceremonies are poorly attended. People are too busy with their personal lives. That’s a shame. I hope readers will make it a point to attend one of the ceremonies to thank, by their presence, the ultimate sacrifices that were made around the world.

QUOTE OF THE MONTH: “A nation that does not honor its heroes will not long endure.” — Abraham Lincoln